“’It is written, My house is the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves” (Luke 19:46).

After the triumphal entry, during which Jesus wept over Jerusalem, the first thing He did was to go to the temple.

Read Luke 19:45-48; Matthew 21:12-17; Mark 11:15-19. What important lesson can we take away form that Jesus had done? What should these accounts say to us as individuals and as members of a community that, in a way, functions like the temple? Eph. 2:21.

All four Gospels mention the cleansing of the temple. While John speaks of the first cleansing 9John 1: 13-25) taking place during Jesus’ visit to the temple at the Passover of A.D. 28, others narrated the second cleansing at the end of Jesus’ ministry, this time at the Passover of A.D. 31. Thus, the two cleansings of the temple provided a parenthesis to the ministry of Jesus, showing how much He cared for the sanctity of the temple and its services, and how strategically He asserted His Messianic mission and authority.

His actions in the temple, especially the second time, which came just before His death, present an interesting question: Knowing that He was soon to die, knowing that the temple and its services would soon become null and void, Jesus nevertheless drove out those who were profaning it with their wares. Why did He not simply leave it alone, in its own corruption, especially since it would not only become unnecessary but, within a generation, would be destroyed?

Though we are not given an answer, it’s most likely because it was still God’s house, and it was still the place where the plan of salvation was revealed, In a sense one could argue that, with His upcoming death, the temple and its services served an important function tin that they were the place help faithful Jews come to understand just who Jesus was and what His death on the cross really meant. That is, the temple, which depicted the entire plan of salvation, could help many come to see in Jesus the “Lamb slain from the foundation of the world” (Rev. 13:8).